Various types of garden tools are known for cutting woody plant material such as branches, stems, stalks or the like. Most of these tools require an operator to grasp a pair of handles to move two blades together to cut the woody plant material between the blades. These hand operated mechanical tools (e.g., shears) may be handy for the occasional cutting by home gardeners, but for hardy materials or repetitive use, such shears prove to be inadequate, tiresome and time consuming. To address these problems, power-assisted-hand-operated cutting tools have been developed. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 2,718,059 entitled "Gardening Implement" describes a hand-held garden trimmer with an electrically activated moving blade and a push-button actuated switch for cutting and trimming lawns, hedges, and shrubbery. U.S. Pat. No. 4,198,748 entitled "Hydraulically Actuated Garden Tool" also describes a hand-held garden tool which is activated when the handle is actuated to move the blade into the guide to cut a branch. Other power-assisted hand-held gardening tools are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,786,625; 2,490,086; 3,834,020; and 5,002,135.
A main disadvantage for all of these types of tools is that each is required to be held by an operator and each requires an operator-assisted trigger mechanism for use. Requiring an operator to hold the cutting tool not only monopolizes use of one of the operator's hands but also leads to fatigue in carrying such a tool. Requiring operator-assisted trigger activation also prevents the operator from having his hands free, slowing down the process and further intensifying fatigue.
Accordingly, there is a need in the art for a cutting device which leaves the operator's hands free to handle the plant materials. There is a further need in the art for a cutting device which is not required to be hand-held or require operator-assistance trigger activation. There is a further need in the art for a fast, economical and easy-to-operate device which readily and safely cuts woody plant material, suitable for commercial, high-repetitive use.
The subject invention solves the above-described needs in the art by providing an automatic cutting device which can be utilized for cutting woody plant material, wherein the device can be automatically triggered by insertion of the plant material into the cutting area.